Abstract
Background and aims - Recent methodological and theoretical advances in community ecology have allowed more robust exploration of complementary facets of biodiversity in plant communities. Focusing on semi-natural permanent grasslands of the French Jura Mountains, we assessed how taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional diversity metrics vary among three phytosociological vegetation units. Methods - We selected a sample of 135 releves out of a phytosociological database, depicting three phytosociological orders (Brometalia erecti, Arrhenatheretalia elatioris and Trifolio repentis-Phleetalia pratensis) and including 381 vascular plant species. We built a phylogenetic tree based on sequences of two genes encoding chloroplast proteins, from which we computed phylogenetic diversity metrics that we compared to various taxonomic, single-trait and multi-trait functional metrics, including communityweighted means of functional traits (CWMs). Key results - Most diversity metrics and CWMs significantly differed among vegetation units. Within each facet of biodiversity, the different metrics showed complementary results. Moreover, even when considering diversity metrics comparable in mathematical terms, i.e. based on Rao quadratic entropy, the results were largely non-redundant among the facets of biodiversity. Phylogenetic diversity and multi-trait functional diversity show opposite responses to vegetation units, as well as a low phylogenetic signal. These two results suggest that phylogenetic diversity cannot be used as a simple proxy for functional diversity. Conclusion - This study highlights the importance of taking into consideration different facets for a better understanding of biodiversity. In particular, phylogenetic and functional facets appear highly informative, and could thus be used in addition to taxonomic diversity metrics as indicators of conservation value. © 2014 Botanic Garden Meise and Royal Botanical Society of Belgium.
Highlights
Beyond species richness, various diversity metrics have been proposed in community ecology, encompassing the different facets of biodiversity in species assemblages, i.e. taxonomic, functional, and phylogenetic (Devictor et al 2010, Pavoine & Bonsall 2011)
Despite these promising results arising from this new analytical framework, little is known about the complementarity of taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional facets of biodiversity at regional scale among vegetation units
We provide a case study based on phytosociological relevés sampled in semi-natural grasslands of the French Jura Mountains across an altitudinal gradient to address the following questions: (1) What is the influence of the altitudinal gradient on the patterns of diversity metrics and community-aggregated plant functional traits (CWMs)? (2) Is there any difference in taxonomic, functional and phylogenetic alpha diversity metrics among the main phytosociological vegetation units?
Summary
Various diversity metrics have been proposed in community ecology, encompassing the different facets of biodiversity in species assemblages, i.e. taxonomic, functional, and phylogenetic (Devictor et al 2010, Pavoine & Bonsall 2011). Some studies have emphasized the interest of studying multiple facets of biodiversity (Devictor et al 2010), including measures of phylogenetic structure and functional trait variation in communities across environmental gradients (Cianciaruso et al 2012, Bernard-Verdier et al 2013). Despite these promising results arising from this new analytical framework, little is known about the complementarity of taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional facets of biodiversity at regional scale among vegetation units. This is notably based on two main assumptions: (i) the traits are surrogates for individual performance (i.e. growth, reproduction and survival, Violle et al 2007) and (ii) the phylogenetic structure can be considered as a surrogate of the functional structure of the community, according to
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